Advent -- Love

“Trust in the LORD with all your heart…”

Do you ever find it hard to trust in the Lord? Whether it be in your everyday struggles, dealing with a health issue, a career or vocational challenge, or the loss of employment?

While I have never been angry at God over my health issues I do find it hard to trust Him sometimes, especially when I feel like I am battling sickness often.  Last October after I had surgery for my endometriosis I had mega health troubles afterward.  I can deal with pain very well.  I have a high threshold for pain but this was different.  I was extremely dizzy and it hurt me to breathe, plus something else but I won't give the details and gross people out.  It was kinda weird since that symptom has disappeared altogether now.  I came to find out that I had a vitamin B12 deficiency which was causing my dizziness.  I also found out that mild acid reflux plus the agitation of the tube from having been down in my throat during surgery was what had caused me to hurt while breathing.  While I may have asked why?  I asked why is this happening to me?  I never got angry at God for my having health troubles.  While I had some issues with trusting the Lord at first I came to trust Him and know that he had a plan for me.  I came to trust him with all my heart.

I have been feeling ill since last Friday. Today I visited my doctor and well, I wasn't expecting to need further testing.  Not a huge deal but my doc wants to make sure that there isn't something with my ovaries causing my fever or pain. God has a plan for each of us. I know he has a plan for me even though I wonder what that could be.  Or what He has in store for me in the future.  All we need to do is trust in Him. Trusting in the Lord can be very hard at times. I know.  With prayer and trusting in the Lord anything is possible and we will be able to overcome any obstacle that is put in out path.  When we trust in God we can overcome our fears and struggles in our lives.  God is our strength. God is our hope. God gives us the grace to do what we should do in our struggles.  God gives us strength when we are weak. God is the Great Healer.  God is Love.

Isaiah 41:10 fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.





Crossposted @ Catholibertarian 

Does Evil Exist?

A Faith Filled Tag: Why Do I Love Jesus?

Happy to accommodate Gina. Thank you for the tag. 


Here are the guidelines: 
*Share five things you love about Jesus/or why you love Jesus.
*Tag five other bloggers.
*Those tagged will provide a link in the comments section here so others can read them.

1. Jesus Christ founded the Church in which he is mystically present and available to us sacramentally. His Church will be here until the end of the world, guiding us through life, and battling the devil -- "And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it." (Matthew 16:18) 
2. Jesus is God and God is love -- "God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him." (1 John 4:16) 
3. Jesus saved me, gave me eternal life by his dying on the cross -- "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." (John 3:16)
4.  I feel Jesus' presence all the time and have also experienced his healing touch. Jesus is the great healer. "Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness." (Matthew 9:35)
5.  Jesus is God the Creator. He created me. He created you. He created all living creatures. He created the whole world -- "IN the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth." (John 1:1,14) 


I tag Marco, Patrick, Sofia, Ancient Soul, and Christopher. 

Preacher Calls For Selfless Love

From the National Catholic Register: 


In a Lenten meditation Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa explained that Christian charity should be characterized by “a love that is both sincere and active; a love from the heart and a love, so to speak, of the hands.” 

Father Cantalamessa warned that those who perform charitable acts without a heartfelt desire to help others may be merely hiding less virtuous motivations, such as “selfishness, the use of others for their own purposes, or simply a guilty conscience.”

He cited St. Paul’s Letter to the Romans, in which he calls on Christians to act with charity without hypocrisy. The call for “a love that is true, authentic and not fake” was the cornerstone of St. Paul’s message, Father Cantalamessa said. Below is the passage he was referring to. 

1 Corinthians 13: 1-5, 13 
If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.  And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.  Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not, dealeth not perversely; is not puffed up; Is not ambitious, seeketh not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinketh no evil;
And now there remain faith, hope, and charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity.


This is one of my favorite passages on charity: 


But this I say, He which sows sparingly shall reap also sparingly; and he which sows bountifully shall reap also bountifully. Every man according as he purposes in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loves a cheerful giver. – 2 Corinthians 9:6-7


 Father Cantalamessa went on to say: 

“Hypocritical love,” the papal preacher said, “is that which does good works without feeling, that shows off to the outside something that is not actually felt in the heart.”

With this in mind, however, it would be a “fatal error” to “hide within one’s inner charity, using it as a sort of alibi to avoid charitable actions,” he said.

With charity that comes from the inside but is also expressed on the outside, he said, “we love others with the same love God has for us.”

Father Cantalamessa said another way to promote a real spirit of love of one’s neighbor includes avoiding gossip, “which seems like something innocent, and, instead, it is one of the things that most makes living together difficult.”

Referring to Jesus’ exhortation to “Judge not, and you shall not be judged,” Father Cantalamessa warned against making negative judgments about others.

While acknowledging that it is nearly impossible to go through life without taking a measure of people and events, the quick jump to harsh judgment is contrary to the message of Christ and of St. Paul, he said.

“It is not that we need to rid our hearts of judgment,” he said. Christians should rather not succumb to “the poison, hostility and condemnation of our judgments,” he said.

Men and women are not the only ones in need of the selfless love for one another, Father Cantalamessa said. The Church, too, “has urgent need of a wave of charity that will heal its fractures,” he said, without mentioning any specific problems.

Freedom to Love: "Have We Had Enough?"

 Christopher West's Freedom to Love video series is here.